Craig Thomson scandal still has plenty of bite

Anyone who thinks that the conviction of Craig Thomson for fraud brings this scandal to a conclusion, pending sentencing, does not appreciate the magnitude of the deception involved. The five years of silence, suppression and delay around this scandal embroiled former prime minister Julia Gillard, the leader of the Greens, Christine Milne, the Fair Work Australia agency and numerous present or former federal Labor MPs.

Long after Thomson's conduct was exposed by the Herald, the Labor Party began secretly paying his legal bills, helped fund his defamation action against the Herald, re-endorsed him for the seat of Dobell, deployed large resources to that campaign and suppressed revelations in the Senate. After his re-election in 2010 saved the Gillard government, the prime minister recorded her gratitude in Parliament on August 16, 2011: ''I have complete confidence in the member for Dobell. I look forward to him continuing to do that job for a very long, long, long time to come.''

The prime minister's droll cynicism fed into a pattern of delay, dissembling, secrecy and suppression.

Some highlights: On August 24, 2011, the acting commander of the NSW Police Fraud Squad, John Watson, sent an email to the then general manager of Fair Work Australia, Tim Lee: "I have left messages throughout the day … requesting that you contact me …'' The commander wanted to discuss Thomson. He tried again the next day.

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Former federal MP Craig Thomson: Found guilty of using his HSU credit card to pay for escorts, amongst other fraud and theft chargesCredit:Pat Scala

On August 26, Lee responded: ''Neither I, nor FWA has power to inquire into, or investigate nor reach conclusions about whether a reporting unit (or anybody) may have contravened a NSW criminal law. Accordingly, I regret to advise that I do not consider it would be appropriate for me, or for any of my staff, to meet with you to discuss FWA's investigation into the HSU [Health Services Union] National Office."

On September 12, 2012, the opposition moved to have seven volumes of documents about Thomson and the Health Services Union released to the public. Labor and the Greens used their majority in the Senate to defeat the motion.

On June 12, 2012, it was revealed under freedom of information, that Fair Work Australia also refused to co-operate with the Victorian Fraud and Extortion Squad.

The police described this as "confusing" and "mistaken".

In May, 2012, it was revealed that Labor had provided $200,000 to fund Thomson's legal bills, which Thomson had not disclosed in the Register of Members' Interests.

At that time Labor's law firm, Holding Redlich, sent a legal opinion to a Senate committee arguing that the FWA report into Thomson be suppressed. This argument was repeated by the then minister for employment and workplace relations, Bill Shorten.

In April, 2012, it was revealed that Thomson had received a secret $160,000 payout from the HSU, partly as a defamation settlement, three years after he had left the union. This, too, was not disclosed in the Register of Members' Interests.

On February 9, 2012, then leader of the opposition in the Senate, Senator Eric Abetz, told the Senate: ''I want to address … the administrative incompetence or the institutional go-slow within Fair Work Australia … On 29 August last year my office put in a freedom of information request seeking documents relating to this matter. We were told flat-out that we would not be given any documents … We had to appeal to the Information Commissioner [who] made Fair Work Australia reconsider their position and we were given a substantive number of documents on 29 December, 2011, a very convenient time of year …

''This request took four months to be fulfilled, and only after the Information Commissioner intervened. Then on 8 February, we were given another 135 pages of information, saying that they had been somehow overlooked … it was only when I indicated to the Senate committee secretariat that we wished to have the freedom of information officer responsible called, and we made another appeal to the Information Commissioner, that these extra 135 pages all of a sudden materialised.''

When Thomson delivered his maiden speech on February 19, 2008, he thanked three key Labor machinists, Mark Arbib, Karl Bitar and Sam Dastyari, as crucial to his support, and added: ''The support I received from the entire union movement but in particular from Unions NSW, the TWU [Transport Workers Union], the CFMEU [Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union] mining division, the PSA [Public Service Association] and, of course, the Health Services Union, was phenomenal.''

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Three of these unions, the TWU, HSU and CFMEU, are named in the terms of reference of the pending royal commission into union corruption.

Paul Sheehan is a columnist and editorial writer for The Sydney Morning Herald, where he has has been Day Editor and Washington correspondent. He is the author of two number-one best-sellers, 'Girls Like You' and 'Among The Barbarians' and been published in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The New York Times and numerous anthologies.